Businesses generally have an internal market for knowledge, such as sales information and technical knowledge. Many businesses are aware that this knowledge can be a competitive asset. Unfortunately, there is a lack of effective inventory systems that allow businesses to manage their knowledge. As a result, many businesses have been unable to measure the growth of and return on their knowledge assets. In addition, many businesses have to repeat or re-invent what they already know.
One problem with knowledge bases is determining a value for various knowledge assets. Since knowledge is an intangible concept, it is difficult to measure and value. Stock markets provide some guidance on how to value physical and intangible assets, such as a return on investment from an asset, or an asset's impact on growth. For example, a stock valuation of a business may even reflect the perceived value of that company's patent portfolio. Unfortunately, stock valuations fail to measure the return on knowledge assets, such as the knowledge assets used to build a patent portfolio. Stock markets offer little direct incentive or guidance on broader knowledge capture and management.
Accordingly, conventional knowledge bases typically focus on a small subset of knowledge, for example, a list of customers, or a patent portfolio. These, however, represent only a fraction of the knowledge assets that enable a business to function and succeed. Moreover, businesses are generally poor at capturing and leveraging knowledge, even where tools have been available to employees to capture and leverage knowledge, because no behavior incentive structure exists for the employees. Employees typically are also unaware of the costs and missed benefits of sharing knowledge assets.
Thus, there is a need to overcome these and other problems and to provide a knowledge asset management system and a method for managing knowledge assets.